The Value of a Life 2
by Ncham9
Summary: Not all scars just fade away. Some take more than time to heal. The wretched, festering ones you caused yourself never really leave, especially not when they're left on other people too. The TVoL that was never supposed to be. Still not a nice, happy story. Heavy self-harm and suicide referencing, among other mature themes and language. (High school AU).
_**The Value of a Life 2**_

Chapter 1 _Recovery_

 **A/N: If you're seeing this when I post it, trust me, you're not even close to as excited as I am. This chapter alone took five months! But I've done a lot of growing. My writing has changed a little and I have changed a lot. I hope I can be better for you guys. Please enjoy the sequel to one of my defining stories, nicknamed 2VoL.**

Humphrey's tossed his head about and his eyes strained to pull apart for a few moments as he tried to regain his senses. They were glued shut, but the lids seemed to not be strong enough to break the bond. However, after some more struggling, he was rewarded with a blinding light stabbing through his eyes and into his head. He moaned pathetically and reclosed them to assuage the pain.

Something felt as though it had been ripped out of his hand, but he couldn't focus on it. His head was spinning and cotton seemed to fill his mouth and ears. There were some dull voices in his room. It sounded like they were close, but it was hard to tell.

He tried to raise lift his arm to cover his eyes, but the limb was nearly limp. He tried to fight the numb weakness of it, but was only able to move his shoulders slightly.

Then a hand was on his right arm, holding it in place. Fingers groped and prodded along skin, which he could barely feel with his blunted senses.

Someone forced his eyelids open again to shine an even brighter light in them. Humphrey whined sorely at the luminous assault. Whoever it was wouldn't let him be at peace, forcing the light into his eye, and then repeated the process on the other one, though he fought back much less the second time. As soon as they let go of his face, he shielded his tender retinas.

The sound around him begged for his attention, growing a little clearer with each passing second. He tried to make sense of it.

"C…ear m…"

He tried to concentrate, though his head was spinning. The world around him seemed so confusing in this torturously bright room.

"..mmph-y"

His head _really_ hurt and he was already tired again, even after having just woken up. He endeavored to stay awake, but it was a hard battle.

"Cah…ear me…mmph-y"

He felt faint, but continued to push himself as more and more, the sounds began to register. He'd be really annoyed if whatever this noise was wasn't important, like just a TV or Charlie waking him up for something stupid.

"Humphrey…"

His eyes shot open despite them only allowing only blurry vision. Someone was calling him, he realized. He took in the room, all white washed walls and simple adornments. He was lying down in a bed, and someone stood over him to his right. They looked at him with a pleasant smile on their face. It was a middle-aged woman, a nurse if her attire was any indication to go by. He just noticed that she had been holding his right hand with a caring tenderness. The feather-light touch was almost too gentle to feel. He stared at her quizzically.

"Well hello, sir" she greeted him pleasantly. He tried to answer, but all that came from his throat was a muffled groan. He attempted to take his own hand from her, but his tingly muscles declined the order. They had yet to wake up and he rather envied them. The nurse noticed the subtle motion and let him go, moving her hand up to his forehead. "Just relax for a second" she said and he managed a slight nod to assent.

"You're thirsty, I bet" she suggested, moving to a bedside table with a plastic pitcher and a pair of paper cups. She filled one with water and presented it to him. When he didn't move in response, she raised the cup to his lips, wetting them and soothing his dry throat.

"Thank you" he managed hoarsely, his voice still dry and cracking.

"Sure thing, sweetheart" she answered softly. He'd never seen her before, but she spoke to him with at least some degree of familiarity or perhaps, she was just used to stuff like this. But what was _this_? He'd been staring at her wordlessly for a couple of seconds before she decided to break the silence. "Humphrey, do you know where you are?" she asked cautiously. Her tone seemed to imply that he didn't have to answer, like she was treading so carefully around him. It was odd. Humphrey knew he was a pretty even tempered person, sometimes he barely showed any emotion at all.

He usually would have said something witty and sarcastic then, but his thoughts were still hazy and his mind still unfocused. He only managed to state the obvious, "In a bed". She laughed and smiled slightly, but continued to press him for a real answer. It wasn't hard to figure out; the sterile, white washed walls, the coarse blankets and his rather elevated bed. The answer quickly became clear to him and with the realization came memories came with it, little snapshots and still frames of his last conscious moments. He saw glimpses of blood, so much blood. It spilled over the countertop. He saw it from below, raining down onto the floor at his level. "A hospital" he murmured quietly, unable to meet the nurse's eyes.

"Good. Now, do you know why?"

"Yes" he said simply. His prickly, stinging wrists confirmed his terrified suspicion. He…he fucked up badly; really badly. His worst nightmare had come to life. He'd done it, or at least tried to, the thing he thought about so much but always told himself no; the thing that had haunted him for so many days. He'd failed himself, was a coward, wasn't strong enough to handle even himself and he tried to take the easy way out. He'd done that incredibly selfish thing that tears people apart and scars them forever, that thing that changes the lives of everyone around him. Wow, did he ever _fuck up_.

He lifted his head enough to look at his wrists, to see them covered and bandaged and the fluid-filled lines stuck into the back of one of his hands. Seeing this, the nurse could reasonably gauge his understanding and his reluctance to talk about it. But protocol was protocol. Still, she could cut him a little slack…perhaps a bad choice of words.

"Humphrey…" she sighed quietly. Deep blue eyes tentatively went to hers. They were red and tired, tortured even. This boy had been through more than she could know. "We're going to have to talk about it…". He shrank back and winced. " _But_ …" she continued, drawing his gaze back for a moment "there are some people here that would really like to see you. Your sisters have been waiting anxiously".

"I only have one…?" he responded dumbly.

She grinned slightly, the smile bringing some light wrinkles to her eyes…which had just winked? "Oh, I see…" she tittered, but before he could voice his confusion she added, "Who would you like to see first?".

He wanted to defend himself from the insinuation, but figured it was useless. "Charlie…" he whispered reflexively to himself. What he had done to her…more clearly, he cleared his throat and answered "My…my sister. The real one". The nurse nodded and went to the door.

Humphrey's gaze dropped down to his bed sheets, rough uncomfortable things. They were pulled up to just below his collar bone, which he supposed he was grateful for, because they hadn't given him a shirt. He had pants though, probably pajamas, not very soft one's either.

He was distracting himself, he realized. He knew that he didn't want to have to talk to Charlie like this, that he didn't want her to see him like this. She probably had already, had probably seen him looking far worse too. She wouldn't understand and she couldn't possibly, but he didn't want her to. The last thing on Earth that he wanted was for her to understand his pain, the true pain and suffering he knew so intimately. But he'd caused her some too, no doubt. He didn't think he could ever forgive himself for that.

With an unhealthy amount of effort, he pushed on the bed to sit up more. Just then, the girl in question walked in, wringing her hands in front of herself nervously. She moved cautiously and once she was fully in the room, the door clicked shut behind her. Tentatively, she glanced up at him and his breath halted.

"H-Hey" she choked out, the words hushed and wavering. He replied something similar, just as timidly, and a stagnant, loaded silence followed. It came to a point where Charlie tried to forcibly break it, but all that fell out of her mouth was garbled, stuttering half-words and nonsense. She was nervous. Her hands hadn't stopped fiddling with each other since she walked in and she'd hardly made any eye contact. It made him feel sick.

"Do I at least get a hug?" he asked meekly, only slightly joking. For a moment, her unease cracked and let through a smile and a short lived laugh. She nodded emphatically and bounded to his bedside in just a couple of steps. In a flash, she reached him, arms extended and eyes watery. Humphrey sat up weakly to meet her.

Until then, he never realized how easily he could recognize her scent, how much his brain associated it with _home_ and all its sappy feelings. He felt safer and comforted and all sorts of things he didn't even know he missed.

He wasn't surprised when his neck started to feel damp.

His sister was whispering nonsense between shuddering sobs and harried breaths. He didn't respond to any of them, only holding her more tightly under her arms. He was silent, looking distantly over her shoulder at a spot on the wall and staring at it with an expression half-way between anger and sadness. He'd never felt so guilty in his life. Well, so far…

"I'm so sorry" she whispered quietly among a multitude of other, less coherent words. He pulled away from her quickly and looked at her solemnly, or, as best as he could manage when he was looking at her puffy, red eyes and tearstained checks. In a voice less soothing than he would have hoped on account of its dry rasp, he warned her about how she was not allowed to apologize; definitely not now, probably not ever again; so grievous were his crimes against her.

The only responses she could give for a while were more wet sobs.

She sat next to him on the edge of the bed and he allowed her to play idly with his hand in her lap as he waited for her to regain some of the evenness in her breath. She didn't say anything in the meantime, but he could tell from the way she drew slow circles on his palm with her thumb that she was thinking about.

"Can…can we talk about it?" she softly blurted eventually. Blood drained from his face as he considered her. He knew it was coming but…it still felt like a fist to the gut. His short silence gave her cause enough to turn her head and look at him. Big, hazel eyes entreated him wordlessly.

"No" he responded simply, but it still seemed like one of the hardest things ever to try and force that one word out of his mouth. She deflated visibly for a second and he added another item to his grievances against himself, until she tried again.

"Humphrey…" she began.

"Charlie, I'm so tired. I can't" he stated, though it came out more like a plea, a whimper. He could see the change in her face where she took pity on him. She was sorry, he knew, but he was glad she didn't say it again.

"Okay…okay, but later" she said firmly, but perhaps not as firm as intended. That was a bridge to be crossed later. He stared at her for a few seconds while he made up his mind.

"…no promises" he muttered and that was his form of a compromise. She took it as the biggest victory she could actually hope for and went back to idly stroking his hand.

Humphrey had a hard time of admitting it, but sometimes a simple hand to hold, a hug, something like that, meant a lot more to him than anything else. It was a sort of lifeline, something warm and secure to drag him out of the thoughts that chilled his skin. He almost fantasized about it at times, trying to imagine it instead of obtaining it, as it was such a difficult thing to ask for. It was made even more difficult by the slowly decreasing number of people who'd be willing.

So he couldn't complain about Charlie's insistence on tickling the small hairs on the back of his hand or the way she held it defensively. It made him a little uncomfortable, like he was a child holding a parent's hand while crossing a street. It was protective. He didn't want to know who she thought she had to protect him from, though…

The door creaked open again. The grating sound was long and drawn out to announce the presence of whomever was intruding on their private moment. The sound was followed by a soft, motherly voice. The nurse walked in, pushing the door open with her hip. She held a plastic tray as she marched toward them.

"Sorry to interrupt, but we really need you to try and eat something, honey" she calmly said, as she strutted toward his bed. The tray was delicately placed in his lap and moments later the nurse was leaving again, only seeing a smile in thanks, which Humphrey did a lazy, half-assed job of faking.

"You heard what she said" Charlie began, interrupting the silent stare he had been giving the miserable looking hospital food. Sugar-free this, low-calorie that. It's like they were trying to tell him _something_. It was degrading. He felt like a chicken being given feed. "You're not going to make me spoon-feed you, are you?" Charlie asked, breaking his intense, contemptuous gaze. When he took the risk of making eye contact, there was a telling trace of genuine concern behind her eyes that he tried not to notice. His pitiful glance at her prompted her to say "Don't look at me like that. You know I'll do it". Rather than try to call her bluff, he obeyed. 'One patronization at a time' he told himself.

It was a slow process. Truth be told, he'd forgotten how to swallow for a small part of it and also struggled with his coordination some, but that last part was nothing new. Still, he refused help. After what seemed like a lifetime, he'd barely made it halfway through the tiny cup of applesauce he had been given. His hands hardly managed to reach his face and everything about him seemed dull and slow. On top of that, every time he blinked, it took him more than a couple seconds to fully open them again. Eventually, the girl got fed up with his sluggish movements and meager appetite.

"Alright, give me that" she blurted with a tinge of exasperation in her voice, but it was playful. She took the cup and spoons from his hands and the tray from his lap. They clacked together on the bedside table. When he didn't object, but simply blinked again tiredly, she gained a little more assurance that she was right. She got up from her spot on the bed and traipsed to a simple light switch on the wall. It clicked off and there she was, standing along the far wall, telling him to go to sleep.

He complied. It was hard to argue when he couldn't even convince himself that he wasn't exhausted beyond measure. He sunk back down into the coarse sheets until he was more horizontal. His head turned and his eyes shut; their heavy weights finally being released. But small, metallic ticks kept him from drifting off into unconsciousness just yet.

"Charlie…" he called out, or rather mumbled out. If it hadn't been so deathly quiet in the room, it would have been overshadowed by a pin hitting the ground. But still, even though she hardly heard the church mouse voice, the girl froze, holding the handle of the door.

"Yes…?" she asked timidly. A pregnant silence followed, but she could have sworn he had said something. But it could've been anything, something important, something he desperately needed her to know, so she was all ears. A short, quiet mumble rumbled out of his general direction, though as he faced away from her, she couldn't be certain his lips had moved. "What?" she questioned cautiously.

"Stay…please…" he murmured weakly, sounding like a feeble beg. But for a moment, that mild request made her dim world a little brighter.

She spent the next few hours, sitting in a chair beside him, watching his chest breathe out every little puff of air. He looked more at peace than she'd seen him in a long while. The creases on his forehead that appeared far too early were gone. His face didn't look dragged down. He even smiled a little in his sleep. And she smiled too as she distracted herself with the hand he had all but outright asked her to hold while he slept. He'd never stop being her little brother.

 **A/N: I can't quite express with words how happy I am that I could bring myself to start this new addition. There was so much of me in the first one, so much that shouldn't have existed in the first place that it was incredibly hard to go back to. I also hit some hard times in my writing career. I had to take a month off after I realized I was freaking out about my stories and worrying about them for all the wrong reasons. I was writing to get the stories done, the ideas out of my head and into yours so that you can enjoy them, and I always felt like I wasn't posting fast enough and that I wasn't posting well enough to not screw up a story so many people (by my standards) enjoy. But I stopped caring about the ideas themselves that made me want to write so much in the first place. Everything became about imaginary deadlines and the disappointment in my own head. So I quit for a month, for five months if you mean for this story. But I'm back and I have a whole lot I still want to do, so I hope I can still make you guys happy and continue a story that had some of you emotionally attached to both my characters and myself.**

 **-Nick (ncham9)**

 **p.s. An immense thank you that will always be woefully inadequate to everyone that has helped me, from the writers who inspire me every day, to Kellylad, to Squid, to one of the greatest friends I've ever known, Peppermint Clouds, and especially to everyone who reads any of my stories. I love you guys.**

 **p.p.s. My ffnet birthday passed on April 14** **th** **and the anniversary of the first story I ever wrote was on April 18** **th** **. A lot happens in a year :)**


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